24 December 2008

Hurry, scurry: procure elusive present for aunt who has everything, wrap extra gift and place under tree for unexpected guests, slip empty-handed into seafood and fruit emporiums and return laden with delicious items, bake assorted treats, clink glasses with friends who appear at door for quick pre-family cheer, count presents again, wrap another extra unlabelled gift, dip into nibbly items just to check freshness and suitability, order bread to be collected from bakery tomorrow morning, engage in fridge tetris with prepare-ahead food and chilling beverages, sing carols to maintain festive spirit, clink another glass, put feet up, consider that more could be done tonight, but there's always that sliver of time tomorrow, wonder if the issue is over-catering or hungry guests, ring family member to check they have collected ham, count guests and try to reconcile with menu, realise under-catering is only likely if cousin arrives with whole new previously unknown tree of family, clink glasses, close eyes just for a second...

Oh - hello 2009!

And it begins with a lovely bunch of books for the young people to read on their long lazy days:

Wombat & Fox Thrillseekersby Terry DentonBest friends Wombat & Fox are back in a third book, and this time they have a list of WILD and DANGEROUS deeds. What can possibly go wrong?

Girlfriend Fiction 9 Bookmark Days by Scot GardnerAvril falls in love for the first time with the boy next door ... problem is, his family and hers are bitter enemies. A Romeo and Juliet story set in sheep farming country.

Girlfriend Fiction 10Winter of Grace by Kate ConstableAt a peace rally, Bridie and Stella rescue a cute Christian boy. He introduces Bridie to a whole world she never knew existed.

In the City by Roland HarveyRoland Harvey's witty, slapstick style brings the city to life in vivid detail.

Here in the House, advance reading copies were like those popular library books, with wild waiting lists and battered covers. They passed with speed from hand to hand as Onion after Onion joined the I Heart Jenna Fox club.

Seventeen-year-old Jenna Fox wakes up from a coma following a terrible accident and remembers nothing...

What happens next is utterly engrossing. Deliciously full of mind-bending questions about ethics and humanity. And above all - unbelievably addictive. But don't just take our word for it. See here and here for a taste of what the peeps are saying about the US edition.

The French, the Germans, the Dutch, the Finnish, the Latin Americans, the Japanese, the Koreans and the Chinese are also welcoming Jenna Fox into their hearts. And the film rights have been snapped up, too. Woot!

Mary, a warm welcome from the Alien Onions - we can't wait for Feb 09 , when our edition of Jenna Fox will make her way out into the world.

11 December 2008

I came late to poetry. I discovered it by accident. I walked into a bookstore looking for crime fiction. Comfort reading. Light. Fast. Dangerous. Fun. I browsed. I can’t remember why I picked up The Monkey’s Mask, but as soon as I read the blurb, I was hooked.

It began: ‘You are about to do something you have never done before.’ It boasted a missing person, murder, deception and a tough, unforgettable streetwise female P.I. ‘You will find yourself reading the crime thriller of the year.’

Excellent. Exactly what I was after. But I had read selectively. I had missed all the clues – and they weren’t hiding: ‘It’s poetry. It’s unlike any poem you have ever read.’ I did not see these words. I’d never heard of a verse novel. It was crime fiction. End of story. I bought the book. It fell open at page 4.

‘It’s poetry.’ I think I said it out loud. I looked around furtively to see if the bookseller had registered my disappointment. Then I read the poem on the page it had opened to.

I’m female

I'm not tough, droll or stoical

I droop after wine, sex or intense conversation

The streets coil around me when they empty I'm female l get scared.

(from The Monkey’s Mask, Dorothy Porter, Hyland House 1994)

She had me at hello.

Some years later I went to a lecture by Dorothy Porter. She said there were four things you must do before reading your work in public.1: Rehearse2: Rehearse3: Rehearse4: Be fantastic.

It sounded like life-lessons. She read her work. She was fantastic.

Afterwards, I felt like I was wearing red shoes and had clicked my heels together. I skipped and swooped past the fountain in the Carlton gardens. I was the kind of student who wore my cynicism on my sleeve, and Dorothy Porter had inspired me to skip, at night, through the park; she showed me what poetry could be.

09 December 2008

On the surface, your rules seem so simple and easy to follow, but underneath you are confusing and convoluted. Why?

regards,

A possibly ignorant but willing-to-learn editor

---------------------------------------Dear Adverbs,

I am writing to inform you that we can never be friends. I admit that used appropriately (See what I did there?) you can add to the richness and flow of a piece of writing. But the simple fact is: I don't trust you. You have a nasty habit of ganging up with your friends and stealing all the thunder from the poor innocent verbs.

Sincerely,

An editor dashing hurriedly out the door to hungrily wolf down her lunch

---------------------------------------

Dear Participle Phrases at the Beginning of a Sentence,

Listening to your lack of rhythm, I quickly lose interest.

Best,

Trad.

---------------------------------------Dear Split Infinitives,

Don't listen to them. I will boldly go where ever you wish to lead me.

Yours,

To edit

---------------------------------------

Dear Microsoft Word Grammar Check

You suck.

Ed.--------------------------------------

Dear Australian Pine Trees

Why do you have branches that grow straight upwards and are thus virtually impossible to hang decorations on? Perhaps you should take a leaf (as it were) out of your northern cousin the fir tree's book. Horizontal branches only, please. It would be appreciated if you could have this implemented by next year.

08 December 2008

Not sure how to answer KRudd's call to spend our way out of the economic crisis?

Books, we say, buy books!Here are some tips to help fill the Christmas stocking.

for the older readers:Somebody's Crying by Maureen McCarthy. We love Maureen. We love the way she makes us feel her characters truly exist, and that if we just turn the right corner at the right time of day, we might even run into one of them. And this one is brimming with suspicion, guilt, love and redemption. Here's a taste.

for the teenage girls:the Stephenie Meyer Twilight books are far too big to lug to the beach (they are best enjoyed curled up on the couch so if there is to be any swooning over Edward*, one doesn't have far to fall) so we say: hello Girlfriend fiction. There are already eight out now - and two more coming very soon - don't they look GOOD! They do go so well on the beach, and there's a cartwheel on the cover of this one.(We do like a cartwheel). Pitched perfectly for 13-16 year old girls

for the littlies:Peka-boo The Smallest Bird In All the Worldby Eliza Feely - a loud and lively book about friendship and finding your voice - and at the end you can all dance the fluttering skippity with seed-cracking gusto.

Tiny, by our Jen castles and Steve Otten, is a wonderful book about a red heeler on a road trip - an excellent gift for anyone with a spirit of Australian adventure or a soft spot for dogs.

for a touch of Christmas (with things to make and do):

the wonderful Roland Harvey's Big Book of Christmas - a treasure chest of Christmas stories around the world, treats to bake, stickers (!) to stick, gifts to make and carols to sing up all the Christmas cheer you need to get you in the swing of the festive season.

and for the adults:Tender Morselsby Margo Lanagan - we are so proud of this wonderful book by our Margo - and it's thrilling that people all over the world are saying such lovely things about it. Oh, so many accolades already - slip over here to sample the many words of praise.

The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas. David Marr described it as THE great Melbourne novel. You've probably seen all the glowing reviews, or had someone rush up to you and say: Oh. My. God. I just read Christos's book, it's amazing, I couldn't put it down. But if not - here, here and here are a taste of what the peeps are saying about it.

And if that isn't enough to get you champing at the bit to gallop on down to your local book store to help spend the economy's woes away - here are a whole host of other terrific Onion gift ideas.

Happy wrapping.

*Just for the record, we understand that there is a lot of swooning over Edward, but the Onions are Team Jacob.

05 December 2008

Out the window, something extraordinary caught our eye. It was unexpected and brash and laced withdanger: young gentlemens water-skiing in the cathedral fountains. For serious!

There are three big rectangle pools, and the water-skiing involved a rope and a 4WD and we suspect some kind of winch contraption, and they water-jumped over the low wall between each pool. They did it several times - and they did tricks! They had us standing on our desks and clapping. A tonic for our Friday afternoon flat spot. Oh, how it swept the glums away!

... well actually, that's not strictly true. It's more that wispy melancholy that sometimes seems to waft in on the warm breeze at this time of year. (Must be because of all the all the end of yearness that goes on; one Onion has even been known to get a little choked up when TV shows she doesn't watch, or even like, all start going on hiatus.)

'This is goodbye, not just to fiction, but to life and family and home - which explains why this pretty, light-hearted fable has such a powerful elegiac undercurrent. All Pearce's books have this strange, unobtrusive power... Every ghost story, most religions and a good deal of modern physics are about the persistence of what is past. But hardly anyone has described it so powerfully and eloquently as Pearce'

'Children still pitch up unexpectedly at his Buckinghamshire home, Gipsy House in Great Missenden, where Felicity, 69, lives. 'It's just awful because they look over the gate and say, "Roald Dahl lives here doesn't he?" And I say, "Well he did." "Oh, has he moved?" And I have to say, "No, he died."'

3) The 10PM Question by New Zealand author Kate De Goldi. Funny, funny, funny and a little bit heartbreaking.

'Tuesday the 14th of February began badly for Frankie Parsons. There was no milk for his Just Right. There was no Go Cat for the Fat Controller, so the Fat Controller stood under the table meowing accusingly while Frankie ate his toast.'

(It's already a bestseller in NZ, but it's not out in Aus till February, so you'll just have to wait a bit.)

'And as I sat there brooding on the old, unknown world, I thought of Gatsby's wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy's dock. He had come a long way to this blue lawn, and his dream must have seemed so close he could hardly fail to grasp it.'

03 December 2008

It seems to be a fairly dramatic approach though. And a bit scary: seeing Peter Pan old and infirm, his spirit slipping away. And Cinderella hooked up to a drip suggests she might just have partied a little too hard at the ball. But the flutter of that red cloak. Oh, Little Red Riding Hood. Quick, pick up a book; read, read against the dying of the light.

But it's not an entirely new idea. Let's not forget Puff the Magic Dragon. The song begins so sweetly, it's upbeat and full of magic and frolicking - but poor old Puff is in for a sad fate...

A dragon lives forever but not so little boysPainted wings and giant rings make way for other toys.One grey night it happened, Jackie Paper came no moreAnd Puff that mighty dragon, he ceased his fearless roar.

His head was bent in sorrow, green scales fell like rain,Puff no longer went to play along the cherry lane.Without his life-long friend, Puff could not be brave,So Puff that mighty dragon sadly slipped into his cave. oh!

01 December 2008

(oh, I know it's always the season for cake, but I was following Obama's lead, using the tricolon for effect, and cake is clearly the most powerful way to finish any sentence).

Anyway, it always feels like true summer when the first cherries of the season appear, all red and plump and ripe with juicy goodness. A sure sign that it's time to dig out that ole Christmas spirit and swing into the festive season*.

But it's been birthday season here, and the very clever cake-maker certainly knows what to do with a cherry or thirty. Oh, hello Cherry Tart.

So 'yes we can' have cake (complete with hearts and stars and candles and a mighty fine number). Omnom.

And not so very long ago we were fortunate indeed when the cake-maker-in-waiting baked a half-century special: Butterscotch Apple Spice Cake served with butterscotch sauce (yes - that is butterscotch sauce, not gravy!) and ice-cream and cream and yoghurt and candles, and even balloons.

Hip hop happy.

*now that it's December we can happily talk up the whole Christmas spirit thang without fear of rule-breaking.